


Grief

by pearky



Series: Short fics [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Psychological Trauma, Short One Shot, Trauma, thats all i write baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-10-13 10:01:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20580680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pearky/pseuds/pearky
Summary: The way Sasuke mourns is vastly different from the way Naruto does.The way he grieves – it scares Naruto.





	Grief

**Author's Note:**

> pfhsgf okay so theres this prompt list going around tumblr where someone sends you a number and a ship and. i misread one of the prompts sent to me and didnt wanna post it to a disappointed anon so. this is it. anon if youre reading this im sorry i love you

The way Sasuke mourns is vastly different from the way Naruto does.

Naruto sobs and screams whenever loss finds him, he shouts into the void until his throat feels like it could rip out of his neck, he slams his fists until they bruise at the knuckles. He throws things around and breaks things. He destroys his surroundings and himself until he’s left a cowering mess, until he can curl up under dark covers and stay inside all day wallowing in his physical and emotional pain. He’s loud and outspoken with how much he aches.

Sasuke isn’t.

The way he grieves – it scares Naruto. It happens three times a year with dates that Naruto can’t quite pinpoint (and doesn’t ask Sasuke about), once in January, once in the summer heat of July (the worst one of them all), and once in early November, and each time it lasts for days that prolong, that feel like months with how much he misses his lover, the one who would laugh and smile furtively, the one who would show him affection behind closed doors. Instead, during the day, he is an empty husk, floating as if everything had been removed and he’s a ghost among men. Like his soulmate’s body operates on its own with no mind to control it. He sits in a single spot and stares in front of himself for hours on end, as if he isn’t quite thinking of anything in particular. He doesn’t eat unless Naruto cooks and sets a bowl of food down in front of him. He eats in a way that is motoric, in a mechanical manner, only skipping a beat when he sometimes stops to stare ahead. He doesn’t talk the whole day, not to him, not to anyone. If Naruto tells him what to do, he doesn’t miss his duties.

During the night, he sometimes shifts out of his ghost-state, however, into something that Naruto can understand better, and he grips and cries and yells into Naruto’s chest in the bed, his entire body wrecks with the convulsion of his sobs, his hand shakes as he grabs onto Naruto’s blond hair, or his own, his fingernails dig into their scalps deeper and deeper. And he hates it, hates seeing Sasuke break down like this, but at least he isn’t just a body floating on airplane mode.

One such night, Naruto decides to stop comforting him, or staying silent, or kissing his tears away, and instead, he prompts Sasuke to talk; it’s been four days and Sasuke has not said a single word to him other than ‘good morning’ when he woke up two days ago and Naruto is going crazy from the silence.

Sasuke’s crying too hard to even breathe for a few more minutes, but eventually his painful, lung-aching gasps die down to a steady shake of quiet hiccups, and he takes Naruto on his word.

“I miss him,” he wails, and Naruto stays quiet to let him know that it’s okay for him to go on. He does. “I hated him for _years_, I killed him.” He pauses. Naruto keeps rubbing his back. “I watched him die, and I watched him die – die again,” A dam breaks. Sasuke’s voice grows desperate, “I saw him _die_, _twice_, and I see him die every day, and I miss him, oh god-“ Naruto’s arms lock tighter around the shaking body, “And then – I think, I think about _you_, and I see you _die_ every day, like he did, like _they_ did, and I almost _killed_ you, and I’d be _dead_ if I had to miss you this much-”

Naruto watches him come undone. He speaks through sobs after that, staining his shirt.

“And, fuck, I… Please don’t go, please don’t leave me. Please. Please, I need you, don’t go, don’t die, don’t let me kill you, don’t die,” He begs in a way Naruto has never heard him before; he feels tears sting at his own eyes and his hands shake like Sasuke’s. He pulls Sasuke into his chest, tries to think of the right thing to say to him, the right promise to make when he knows there are none in this world that he can keep. He can’t come up with a single word; he listens instead to his lover begging him, “please, please,” like a chant, and then, “I love you, I love you so much,” over and over, like a broken record, like he’s left autopilot on, like a ghost haunting a cemetery.

**Author's Note:**

> give me a comment n kudos if you liked it. i love you buh bye. heres my [tumblr](https://pearsasuke.tumblr.com/) hmu lets talk about narugaa or somethig


End file.
